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My own signature on the Manhattan Declaration is a witness to my strong agreement with what I take as its basic tenets, particularly what it has to say against murder, sodomy and like crimes and perversions. A unified Christian, indeed, a Judeo-Christian, witness is needed against these things, and I am pleased to join myself to such unities.

But I do have reservations, very strong reservations, about this document’s ambiguity on what are distinctively Christian opinions and responsibilities in light of recent social and political developments. In it “modern democracy,” (!) women’s suffrage, and opposition to slavery (which the scriptures do not abolish, but regulate in such a way as to discourage most of its forms), are put in the same moral category as opposition to homosexualism, abortion, and euthanasia. This admixture appears based upon the conjunction of revealed religion with the natural law as set in creation by its Creator, at the head of which is the mind of man–law which defines nature's constitution from the physical to the structure of human society, including the general moral precepts by which it must be governed. Clearly the Declaration was composed in such a way as to be acceptable to the largest possible number of professing American Christians, but in doing this I believe it has attempted to mix the oil of Christianity with the water of popular American religion, and forgotten some things it needs to remember.

Surely there is, for example, a time and place for Christians to defy Caesar, when what a government demands of Christian citizens is contrary to their faith, and obedience to the government is disobedience to God. It is not simply that in our day and age the necessity for civil disobedience among Christians may be close at hand, but in countless instances it has shown itself to be already here, especially in districts controlled by anti-Christian constituencies, their politicians and judges. It is, however, necessary to draw distinct lines between the civil disobedience of those who disobey to follow a divine precept and that which is a reaction to the abrogation of their rights under the United States Constitution.

I was troubled in listening to recent video presentations on this subject by Charles Colson and Timothy George, both men for whom I have great respect and admiration. As representatives of the Manhattan Declaration, they pointed out the looming possibility of resistance to the inhumane and anti-Christian laws promulgated by the current leaders of the United States, and the history of Christian civil disobedience beginning in the apostolic age. But Dr. George’s presentation became immediately ambiguous when he stepped away from the exposition of principles based on the Lord’s division of his domain and Caesar’s to drawing his examples of Christian behavior from pre-constitutional free churches, from early Baptists and Quakers who were persecuted for their insistence on putting their doctrines forward in Puritan Massachusetts.

Freedom of religion is not a Christian principle. It is a secular constitutional principle which, as understood and enforced in the United States, has favored the majority of religious Americans, relieving them from the burden of establishment, and giving the Republic the manifest advantages of a free religious citizenry. There is, however, another distinctly unpopular but unquestionably Christian side to the matter: The Massachusetts Puritans regarded belief that a person should be allowed the public service of whatever religion he chooses as a radical failure of charity, a license for false doctrine and social anarchy. (The generality of American Christians, provoked by the activities of groups like the Mormons, Jehovah's Witnesses, and Christian Scientists, has shown similar impatience at the limits of its own tolerance.)

The early New Englanders viewed it as their responsibility before God, as long as they had the power to do so–borrowing here the words of the Anglican Ordinal–“to banish and drive away all erroneous and strange doctrines contrary to God’s word,” and so to treat Baptists, Quakers, and other varieties of aggressive errorist with a notable lack of civic toleration. The early struggles in religious freedom in this country, in other words, were typically between varieties of Christian, the losers when it came time to compose the Bill of Rights by Enlightenment principles probably having the stronger case from Christian tradition, in which toleration of bad religion by Christians in power has a very meager history.

In present context the idea of the unjust law–which by definition is, of course, un-Christian–seems to be providing the necessary baptismal lubricant for the regeneration of Caesar into God in a manner not unlike the movement whereby natural law is used to justify a principle that is highly debatable from a Christian point of view, such as opposition to the divine right of kings in the name of the natural rights of citizens. But Augustine’s famous dictum that an unjust law is no law at all is no help in deciding the status of a law as Caesar’s or God’s, which is what we must know as well as we can before we decide whether or how we can break it. We may ascertain with full and reasoned conviction, for example, that a tax, or a law that arbitrarily favors one class of citizen over another, is manifestly unjust, and perhaps even therefore “no law at all” (I suspect Augustine the rhetorician couldn’t resist the extraordinary epigrammatic force of lex iniusta non est lex–that something which by its own nature opposes itself cancels its own existence). Thomas Aquinas [ST 1-2, q. 96, a.4], thinking more cautiously, notes, “such laws do not bind the conscience, except perhaps to avoid scandal or disturbance, on account of which one should yield his right. As Christ says, ‘If someone forces you to go a mile, go another two with him; and if he takes your tunic, give him your pallium,’ ” so indicating that unjust laws still have the form of law and are to be reckoned with as such, so that we may rightly–and in fact sometimes by the Lord’s command–chose to tolerate and obey them even though we find them unjust.

But there are no such options with God’s laws. They must be obeyed–so that if an unjust civil law is contrary to divine law, we must break it, and to do this there must be a vivid distinction between divine and human law, characterized by our Lord as what is due to Caesar and what is due to God, that cannot be homogenized by the principle that all unjust laws stand against what is due to God in the same way or demand the same actions. They do not.

That is where the problem with Martin Luther King as a Christian witness comes in. There can be little doubt that he was standing against unjust laws which denied American citizens their full constitutional rights on basis of race. Although he used the language of Christiani

ty to make his case, there was nothing distinctively Christian in his stand on civil rights. He was challenging Caesar on the existence of sub-Caesarianism in Caesar’s own realm, and appealing to Caesar, to Caesar he quite successfully went. He did not have the qualifications or the brief for a Christian saint or martyr, and for Christians to make him out to be such can only result in embarrassment. Rather, he is a father of a national–a Caesarian, if you will–constitution, like Jefferson or Wilberforce.

We owe a debt of gratitude to those who have produced the Manhattan Declaration, but in order for it to have the highest level of integrity they must be very careful about the way they promulgate it. It is looking more and more like a document born in an opinion shared by a certain strain of Enlightenment liberalism and prominent representatives of the Reformation’s left wing, elevated to ius divinum by the application of natural law categories. This approach obscures what I think is the real desideratum: that it lay down Christian principles to inspire Christian resistance to the tyranny of the Godless Party now in power. To do this, it must stay very, very close to advocacy of the unquestionably and universally Christian (which does not include democracy, freedom of religion, women's suffrage, and rejection of kings, but does include opposition to abortion, homosexualism, and euthanasia), and at all costs avoid using natural law argumentation to appeal to the loose and uncatholic pieties of the largest possible number of modern American churchgoers.

I suggest a second, revised edition.

61 Responses to: ‘God, Caesar, and the Manhattan Declaration’

“To do this, it must stay very, very close to advocacy of the unquestionably and universally Christian (which does not include democracy, freedom of religion, women’s suffrage, and opposition to monarchy, but does include opposition to abortion, homosexualism, and euthanasia)”

Are you advocating that America become a theonomy, then, or simply suggesting that freedom of religion, women’s suffrage and freedom from indentured servitude aren’t specifically Christian aims (neutral to Christianity, that is)?

If the former, which variant of Christianity would you like to see become the standard for America and how would that be enforced?

“Are you advocating that America become a theonomy?” No. “Or simply suggesting that freedom of religion, women’s suffrage and freedom from indentured servitude aren’t specifically Christian aims?” Yes, but not “simply,” and I say nothing about indentures.

Frankly, I didn’t understand everything you said, but I believe I did understand the gist of it. And, I thank you for bringing up a very important subject, which is not often discussed.

I’ve often thought about the fact that democracy is not really a Biblical concept, yet most Americans (including virtually all American Christians) hold it as an unquestionable good. And many, believe we should do all in our power to ensure that people in all other countries have the right to vote for their leaders, etc.

High taxes and wasteful spending, in my opinion, are not good for this country, in the economic sense. (And, there is Biblical support for praying for the economic prosperity of the juridiction where you live [Jer. 29:7].) However, high taxes are not, in my opinion, counter to God’s law–if, indeed, we could define high taxes. Certainly, paying high taxes is not counter to God’s law. In fact, paying taxes is required by God’s law (and I don’t think the Biblical text or proper exegesis would allow for deciding that God only commands us to pay the amount of tax we think is fair or reasonable). I should think that wasteful spending is counter to God’s law, but then it’s hard to get many Christians to agree on what constitutes wasteful spending (perhaps Government funding of abortions, perhaps teaching grade school children how to use condoms, but probably not enough programs to make a significant dent in the budget).

Frankly, I’d like our government to go back to, primarily, the functions of the Federal government enumerated in the original Constitution, but is is not because I believe the Constitution has a divine imprint. It is because, in my opinion, those functions seem to be the proper ones. And, in general, they seem to line up more or less with the governmental functions that appear to be God’s intention for government in the post-apostolic era (including today), as taught in the Bible. But, again, in line with what you’ve said, this is just my opinion, and, though it is not wrong for me to push forward my political agenda (as long as I believe it is ultimately for the glory of God and the advancement of His Kingdom), I need to be extremely careful before I tell anyone that what I am proposing is God’s (moral/ethical) will.

What is indentured servitude but contract employment? It may or may not be disordered, but is not per se evil at all.

Chattel slavery is an entirely different thing. The Church today rightly condemns it, but, in defense of the Church (and churches) of the past, she was required to live in the world that actually existed.

SMH, I agree. The Declaration unfortunately conflates the two cities–the defense of God’s is a moral absolute; the defense of Man’s, at best a prudential preference.

For many years I have had a very difficult time understanding the strange infatuation of American Christians with democracy, which was something most of the founding fathers wished to avoid, knowing as they did the history of democracy in the ancient world as the rule of self-serving incompetence–something that happened when a country fell into disorder. John Adams in particular seemed concerned about the future of the United States as a democracy. But people don’t know these histories any more, of their own country, much less that of Athens.

Christians are monarchists, who give their allegiance to a King, awaiting his coming in glory and majesty to smite his enemies and rule with a rod of iron. His apostles gave explicit instructions to honor and obey earthly kings, and to give them their due as placed in their office by God. I believe the American Revolution (and others like it) was a reprehensible and unlawful act of rebellion against our earthly sovereign, and had I been alive at the time would have, if it were possible, left the United States, either to return to England, or go to one of the other colonies.

But I wasn’t alive then, and was born a citizen of the United States, upon which God has indeed, despite its deserts, shed remarkable grace, including that of an excellent constitution, around which questions now arise concerning the American polis and that of the Kingdom of God.

Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.

–John Adams, Letter to John Taylor, 15 April 1814

. . . and from another student of history:

A democracy cannot survive as a permanent form of government. It can last only until its citizens discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority who vote will vote for the candidates promising the greatest benefits

from the public purse, with the result that a democracy will always collapse from loose fiscal policies, always followed by a dictatorship.

I must take issue with your assertion that freedom of religion is not a Christian principle. If you mean merely that it has not been one traditionally practiced or proclaimed by Christians through the ages then I agree. But this is one area in which most churches have learned the hard way what should have been obvious long ago, that you can’t protect the Gospel of peace with the sword of the world.

There are some truths that have to be learned by experience. When the church was persecuted by the state there was little possibility of thinking to use state power in defense of the Gospel. But once Constantine made Christianity protected it was a different story. The temptation was now there, disguised as a blessing. But the history of the church has shown that whatever benefits it brought were more than offset by the corruptions of state power, the worldliness and the oppression of the dissident at the hands of the church that came with that power. It has not been a pretty picture regardless of the intentions. No longer content to compel people to Christ through love and to discipline them with threat of disfellowship, now the enticement was with worldly status and protection and the threat was loss of property, freedom or life, things the Gospel teaches us to despise for Christ’s sake.

Power corrupts, and it corrupts those who use it. Do you believe that the ring of power can be used by the pure without tarnishing them? Can you find in Scripture any justification for the use the sword of earthly king’s to do the work of the heavenly King? Does God need such power?

God calls us to come to him freely. His death on the cross is testament to his toleratiion of evil at great expense so that we might chose to serve him freely. If the freedom of conscience is not a Christian idea then I have no idea what the Gospel is all about. Why preach at all? Why not just tell people what they are to believe? That always works fine, doesn’t it?

The worldly sword is meant for worldly rulers to use to enforce worldly peace and justice, which are necessary primers for undeerstanding and receiving the grace of God. But grace cannot be taught by force, nor can it be defended. Force will destroy it. For the sake of the Gospel the doctrine of religious freedom is one that Christians need to accept lest we be seduced again into using the necessarily evil power of the state to do the work of God. Such harms the Christian witness, making a mockery of the cross and oppresses the consciences of those Christ died to redeem.

This is the kind of discussion, the kind of disagreement, I was hoping for–the kind for which Mere Comments was meant. I have been provoking enough for one day. Perhaps someone else would like to take it up . . . .

I take it that you believe in a Divine Right of Kings (from which the conclusion that “the American Revolution … was a reprehensible and unlawful act of rebellion,” could follow immediately), or at least some form of that Right that may or may not be similar to the one that kings of the 1700s appropriated to themselves. This being an Ecumenical forum, it may be of use to say that not everyone here believes in a divine right of kings (the plural is important). But it does not destroy our ability to agree with smh’s fine critique of the the Manhattan Declaration’s reasoning, the removal of that particular from his argument doing no great damage.

Furthermore it will be of use to recall the difference between a Democracy and a Republican Form of Government, as the terms were understood by John Adams and his contemporaries and compatriots. Federalist #14 is appropriate reading, here. It’s not like the American Founders did not think about this. If your point is that we will always pray “that the man of the earth may oppress no more” (Psalm 10:18) under no matter what form of government, and concomitantly that American Christians should divest from thinking that the form of government they think they have is chosen of God, then we agree.

“Freedom of Religion” is perhaps a bit of an ambiguous concept. And in one a narrowly drawn sense, freedom of religion does seem to be part and parcel of Christianity. But, in its broadest sense, perhaps freedom of religion is simply a debatable principle of governance.

For example, were a political state to require its people to adopt a specified religion on pain of death, then I would say that authentic Christians would have to stand against that sort of thing as a matter of Christian duty. But, a were a state merely to establish a particular Faith–perhaps only giving the franchise only to adherents–then I do not think that Christians would have a religious duty to oppose the state.

In sum, I do think that an element of Christianity is a principle of freedom of conscience, but that that principle is nowhere near as broad as the legal principles of religious freedom that have currency in contemporary American jurisprudence. And, moreover, I believe that, perhaps, this is exactly what SMH is saying.

I agree that grace cannot be taught by force, but “freedom of conscience” falls short of the Christian ideal. I must become a slave to Christ if I would be free from sin. America’s founding fathers were much more modest in their aims when establishing their new Government — Safety and Happiness were their stated ends, not salvation and eternal life. If one wants the latter, one must lay down one’s own, flawed conscience and be conformed to the mind of Christ.

This is an attitude that is fundamentally alien to Enlightenment principles. It harks back to a much earlier hebraic mindset that values wisdom above enlightenment. Biblical wisdom doesn’t care a fig for freedom of religion. When we follow Christ, we lay down our claims to a free conscience or the freedom to practice any religion.

Blake, you misunderstand what I mean by freedom of conscience. The conscience is to be free from the state, not from God, for the latter is an oxymoron. I understand conscience in the catholic sense as that part of us that seeks what is right, that distinguishes between good and evil and informs our ethics. It is through this that God speaks to us. To be a slave to Christ is to freely follow one’s conscience, but a conscience that is itself enlightened by Christ and submitted to him. No one can knowingly oppose God and be true to his conscience. Pope JPII was quite eloquent when speaking of this to the youth in Denver back in 87 or 86. But one may unknowingly do so because his conscience is corrupted, or perhaps his understanding of it is. He may be deceived or under influence of generations of bad understanding. In this case his conscience must enlightened so that he can see the truth all the better.

But this cannot be done by force. A man will only see the truth when it resonates with his conscience and vice versa. You cannot force a man to change his conscience. You must persuade him. If he believes that X is wrong, even if his is mistaken, to force him to do X would be to force him to go against his conscience. Paul was clear about this in his admonition about being considerate of the weak brother.

Unless a man sees clearly through his conscience that a path is wrong he cannot be dissuaded from that path without doing harm to the very voice within him through which God is meant to speak. This is the very principle embedded within the Declaration of Independence when it speaks of the “pursuit of happiness”, for happiness did not mean pleasure or euphoria like it tends to mean nowadays. Happiness was that of the soul that is right before God. It is the pursuit of that spiritual happiness that is the work of the conscience.

Freedom of conscience is one of the highest of Christian ideals. It recognizes that there is no authority on earth higher than the conscience within us that seeks to do right. It is the conscience that is the home of the “still small voice of God”.

Of course this raises the question of whether the church violates a man’s conscience when it makes fellowship conditional upon his acceptance of its morals and beliefs. NO. That is IF, and only if the man is compelled to be in the fellowship of the church by his conscience and not by any worldly force or enticement. It is like when Peter responded to the Lord’s question, “Do you also want to leave?” by saying, “Where would we go? You have the words of eternal life.” Notice he doesn’t say. “You can make bread fall from heaven”. Jesus was quite clear that he didn’t value that kind of motivation. If a man knows in his heart that the church is where he will receive the grace of God and be strengthened in his spirit, that he can only be true to his conscience when he is in fellowship with the Body of Christ, then to be severed from that Body is a form of…spiritual education, like the mundane education we receive when we first learn that sticking pins in electrical outlets is a bad idea. Pain is a marvellous educator, and the pain, or pang of the conscience the most supreme religious instructor. It is that type of spiritual torment that I believe Paul was indicating when he told the church at Corinth to deliver the sinner to Satan. But a man cannot properly feel the sting of his conscience when it is accompanied by the sting of the lash, which is why the church must reject the use of force.

I stand by what I said on freedom of religion not being a Christian principle. In a sense the institution is a bowing to inevitability, for the conscience is at natural, that is, created, liberty to hold to what it will (a liberty which only its Creator can remove), and religion in its purer forms deals with ultimacies for which people will resist for conscience’s sake to the point of death. It is foolish for even the most hostile government to deny this freedom, at least up to the point where the practice of religion threatens to upset peace and order. Thoroughgoing secularists can advocate the principle on practical grounds–which was the actual state of affairs in the Roman Empire: believe what you wish and worship whichever gods you choose, as long as it doesn’t upset the Pax.

This is why secular governments on either side of the Constantinian age have had trouble with Jews and Christians, who, claiming to possess the oracles of God, are not constitutionally opposed to them, but insist that where there is a conflict of laws, that of God must prevail.

The United States has been the last great (and particularly creative) bastion of the dying symbiosis of church and state begun in the fourth century. Its government is now aggressively secular, but I confidently predict it will never jettison freedom of religion. Like the Roman Empire and the Soviet Union it will support the principle, and even encourage the growth of state-approved religion (there can be no Beast without a False Prophet), but will identify orthodox Christianity–not liberal religion, which trims its sails to the cultural winds–as a religio illicita, because it disturbs what American culture and government, having successfully redefined its “peace” in the last several generations, now identifies as such. We see early examples of things to come in violent police action against anti-abortion demonstrators, which can be done with as much freedom of religion plausibility as the nation had when it took action in the past against other turbulent sects.

I believe the situation you envision here in the West and what existed in the Roman empire is the freedom of worship rather than of religion. Hillary Clinton has begun to talk about freedom of worship. This is meant to limit the sphere of religion to actions performed indoors. You can say what prayers you want in church but don’t oppose the state outside or presume to lift up an authority in opposition to the state. You are free in this way because religion has been made such a small thing that it doesn’t matter to the state.

True Freedom of Religion, one the other hand, understands that religion is not a thing of little importance but one of such importance that the state must not be allowed to intrude upon it. It is a freedom which circumscribes the power of the state, telling it that its authority is not absolute. Without freedom of religion, the freedom of conscience, the liberty of the church will always be tenuous.

I believe that in the nineteenth century the liberal utopian dreams led to a new cultural Constatinianism of the left where state power and the religious aspirations of an increasingly modernist society were wedded. From this all manner of progressive models have arisen which suppress the individual and ignore the freedom of conscience when it opposes the enlightened future. You are free to worship as you choose as long as you acknowledge the implicit power of the state to reach in even into the walls of the church when matters of “justice” demand, defined by the state of course. You are also free to believe what you choose even to believe that the state is wrong, as long as you don’t speak it openly, for that would be “hate-speech”.

There is nothing Constitutional about this progressive totalitarianism. It hates the Constitution as a limit on its power. While the culture was still moderately Christian there was little resistance to the gradual godlike assumption of state power, because the state would never press too much beyond the bounds of cultural acceptance. That frog had to be boiled slowly. And little resistance to the state meant that it didn’t have to bare its fangs to establish its power. But now that the cultural slide has taken this nation outside the bounds of Christianity a resistance has mounted which is forcing the state to ramp up its control over dissident voices. The beast of Babylon we face now is a result of our inattention to both the religious state of the culture and the freedom of conscience crucial to religion and the protection against tyranny.

While we still have the ability to influence the state it is incumbent upon us to do something to steer it back to the course of freedom so that individuals may be free, even to reject God, and so that the church may be free to call them back, and be uncorrupted by power so that its voice will sound like Jesus’ and not Caesar’s.

Biscuits, I think you seriously misread Romans 13 as applied to Jesus’ statement that his kingdom is not of this world. Kings in this world bear the sword to punish wickedness for this world’s sake. They do not bear it to punish heresy. Paul nowhere implies that kings are meant to punish God’s enemies.

Ever hear “Vengeange is mine”. God takes care of his own business that way.

As for the theocracy of Israel, that expired with the coming of Christ and the giving of the Spirit to the church. If Israel were used to justify the spiritual power of earthly kings on God’s behalf it would make mincemeat of Christ’s distinction between God and ceasar.

Christopher, thanks for the clarification. I was indeed hearing “freedom of conscience” through modern/post-modern filters that advocate the unrestrained freedom of the individual in all settings.

I don’t know how much of this reflects my roots in a hyper-intellectualized evangelicalism that tended to reduce everything to the cerebral, but I have always understood my conscience to be fallen along with the rest of me. God has usually spoken to me most strongly through reason, and I continue to find conscience / will / feelings to be murky waters in which to discern God’s voice. (A mixed metaphor there, but it seems apt nonetheless.) I distrust how often my conscience seems to align with opportunity. I guess I should be encouraged if it is true that it speaks more clearly to others.

If freedom of conscience is a high Christian ideal, where is that written in scripture? The phrase still has for me a strong Western flavor that does not seem to be universally experienced in other cultures. What is the role of conscience in tribal conversions in Africa? What is the role of conscience in an Asian culture imbued with ancestor veneration?

I think, though, I am quibbling about semantics, as I still agree with your assessment that forced faith is an oxymoron. In spite of all the historical evidence to demonstrate just how poorly totalitarianism actually works, there still seem to be many who, verbally at least, would gravitate to it.

>Kings in this world bear the sword to punish wickedness for this world’s sake. They do not bear it to punish heresy.

Even if one were to concede the dubious point that there is no point to the state suppressing evil beyond the temporal it would be interesting to hear someone try to defend the idea that heresy is an evil with no temporal consequences.

Hmm, if the American Revolution was an evil rebellion, precisely how do you categorize all the other rising and fallings of power throughtout history? And how far back would we have to go to find the true deposed Monarch nursing his divine right? After all, the American colonies rebelled against an “English” king who was descended from a Scotsman (king James), who was the nearest of kin to the aftermath of a bloody family feud in which Protestants warred against Catholics (Queens Mary and Jane), and saw for a time a Spaniard on the throne (King Phillip). This is of course after more than 100 years of fighting to sort out who had the divine right to rule England after the Frenchman William the conqueror deposed the “rightful” King Edward, who inherited his kingdom with no small trouble after the Germans toppled Rome’s “right” to rule the British Isles. Need I go on? Ever since God stopped sending prophets to either personally anoint kings, or write books claiming that he was raising certain empires to power, the notion that God favors any entity in power is difficult to defend (and to be fair, this applies to democracies, republics, monarchies and any other conceivable form of government), and it may be fairer to say that He is ambivalent in that His will is to be accomplished regardless.

All government begins as a protection racket. The Christian Religion is, I think, rather agnostic about how one protection racket, vis-a-vis another, takes and holds power. Ideally, one protection racket is so much stronger than all contenders, that the outcome of conflict is known to all, and government can be installed with a minimum of blood-shed. It is the lack of certainty about the outcome of a conflict that causes wars to begin with. (Either that, or insanity in would-be fighters certain to lose, in which case it is far better for society as a whole that they be eliminated.)

But whether or not one or some other protection racket is somehow more just, or more righteous, or more likely to bestow goodies to me and my family, the Christian religion, following St. Paul and the Fathers, wishes for every man to live peacably; and this means not resisting human authority (i.e., your local protection racket) except when that authority demands you do some evil.

So the Divine Right of Kings is about as true as the Divine Right of Tsunamis: Who can know the mind of God? We’re stuck with the protection racket we have. Is that God’s will? Who knows?? And unless it can be thrown off without killing or being killed (i.e., with overwhelming force), it’s not likely prudent to try to throw it off.

Even if one were to concede the dubious point that there is no point to the state suppressing evil beyond the temporal it would be interesting to hear someone try to defend the idea that heresy is an evil with no temporal consequences.

Indeed, such an assertion would be idiotic. If it is true that ideas have consequences (and temporal consquences are in fact what is meant in the saying), then it is trivially true that heresies have temporal consequences. And without drawing any lines too clearly, I’d say the entirety of the Enlightenment was founded on a heresy (or perhaps suite of heresies), and has had nearly apocalyptic temporal consequences.

Even liberals, who would otherwise be constitutionally disposed to believe that mere theological concerns have no temporal consequences, nevertheless lay all perceived evils on various heresies. It’s just that their heresies (the only heresies allowed to exist) exist solely to explain various temporal consquences perceived to be bad: Ergo, the modern heresies of unsustainability, exclusiveness, and (the biggest, baddest of all) institutional sexism and racism.

“I believe the American Revolution (and others like it) was a reprehensible and unlawful act of rebellion against our earthly sovereign, and had I been alive at the time would have, if it were possible, left the United States, either to return to England, or go to one of the other colonies.”

That option is still open to you.

I do not think that sciptuure gave a blueprint for the details of our lives. It gives general guindance and also gives us the ability to use our reason to develop agreed ground rules for to organize our relaships with other people. Democracy is one of those rules that seems to wrok pretty well (considering the alternatives). All forms of monarchy have not panned out so well.

There is only one King and one legitimate Kingdom and it is not of this world.

Well, not really, since SMH was born in the USA, and does not AFAIK have some 200+ year old right of return… So USG is his caesar now, and he doesn’t, if you would read him, profess a problem with that.

With Robert Epse and JRM, I’ve come to think now that smh’s characterization of the American Revolution is seriously misleading: I’m afraid he has made grey into black. There is virtue in the fight for principles. The virtue, known by its fruit, does not vanish just when the principles are “highly debatable.” Would he take a look, for goodness’ sake, at Africa? (I’d smile if Dr. Hutchens were forced to admit that we Americans had led a gentlemen’s reprehensible and unlawful act of rebellion.)

In a brief point of defense of the revolution’s principles, the divine office that kings like George III indefensibly appropriated to themselves made them deserving laughingstocks. “The Heathens paid divine honors to their deceased kings,” observed the unbelieving Thomas Paine, “and the christian world hath improved on the plan by doing the same to their living ones” (Common Sense, sec. II). To say nothing of the king’s madness, which Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence was courteous in not mentioning.

“So USG is his caesar now, and he doesn’t, if you would read him, profess a problem with that.”

The whole point of his article is that he *does* in fact have a problem with his current Caesar. I’d like to see the his suggestions for the revised version of the Manhattan Declaration that would address the point he is making more explicitly.

There is virtue in the fight for principles. The virtue, known by its fruit, does not vanish just when the principles are “highly debatable.” Would he take a look, for goodness’ sake, at Africa?

And what principles are those: No taxation without representation? The American revolution stands unique in history, as near as I can tell unless you count peaceful secessions, as a rebellion of the least oppressed against what was, at the time, the most liberal of governments the world had ever known. No. It is not debatable that one should not rebel against duly recognized authority, and thereby risk killing and being killed, just for the right to buy your sugar from Spain, or to have a trifling tax on tea withdrawn.

And what of Africa? Look at all the great good rebellion has done for them.

As to the supposed sobriety of Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence, perhaps you would at least be open-minded enough to read the other side of the story.

The victors, of course, get to write the history. But we’d be fools to always believe them.

James the lesser, nice try. But sovereignty exists not with the collective will of any people, however expressed; but in the actual sovereign: the actual executive who ultimately compels SMH’s tax paying, irrespective of the transparently unjust and wasteful ends for which it is collected, and who will ultimately shoot him if he resists long and hard enough.

I thank Steve Nicoloso for trying to clarify what I said for the smart-alecks. Clearly no Christian can avoid belief in what the Confucians called the Mandate of Heaven, and commented upon so extensively by the Old Testament prophets–its gain and loss by rulers. That’s how smh works with “rising and fallings of power throughout history.”

I did not preface my remarks on the American Revolution with “I believe” with the intent that it be ignored. That means that’s how it looks to me. And the bumper-sticker comment of the “Love it or get your ass out” variety, as Mr. Nicoloso once again noted, was simply a nasty crack that had nothing to do with the topic.

A gentlemen’s rebellion? Certainly, compared to the revolution in France–and almost Christian to boot. In fact, probably the best darn unlawful rebellion that ever there was, producing (bowing here to Sir Winston) the very best of bad governments.

John Adams’ misgivings, however, were well-founded when he noted that the nation could only sustain itself as long as it had a citizenry that was both diligent and moral. Christian teaching, as I understand it, is that man is by nature neither. Now, peculiar infusions of grace, such as God shed on this nation, are manifest in unusual degrees of virtue, civic and otherwise. But when the glory has departed and the original rebellion reasserts itself, now not just in the rejection of the earthly but the heavenly king, the Republic shows itself to have been nothing more than a democracy all along.

Not intended as a snide bumper sticker, but shorthand for the fact that if we are in a democracy, and not merely an oligarchy with a veneer, we are involved (implicated?) already in a system that claims to derive its legitimacy from us.

Implicit in that claim is the possibility that we can withdraw that legitimacy. That seems to contradict the statement that all governments are established by God. But since God also disestablishes governments you can take this as a built-in recognition that He might; almost a method for it.

In any event, other aspects of democracy can be irksome. If you take your role as responsible citizen seriously you have to study the problems of the city from within the limits of this world, since the city is not a creature of eternity and must not wait for divine justice. This mixes a little uneasily with attempts to discipline yourself to turn the other cheek. Your duty requires that you spend some of your time thinking like Caesar, when maybe you want to think like Christ.

Ah, your statement brings back memories of my first serious encounter, at the time of the Bicentennial celebration, with America’s “Founding Godfathers” — George “the Hatchet” Washington, Thomas “Freckles” Jefferson, Ben “Philly” Franklin and Tom “Scribbles” Paine, amongst others. I can’t imagine a finer group of racketeers than these gentlemen!

Seriously, though: your statement that

“The Christian Religion is, I think, rather agnostic about how one protection racket, vis-a-vis another, takes and holds power.“

That is where the problem with Martin Luther King as a Christian witness comes in. There can be little doubt that he was standing against unjust laws which denied American citizens their full constitutional rights on basis of race. Although he used the language of Christianity to make his case, there was nothing distinctively Christian in his stand on civil rights.

Given that the Rev. King clearly and loudly expressed his belief that SEGREGATION — which was a religious, social, cultural, political AND legal phenomenon — was an abomination because it denied the unity we have in Christ, I fail to see your point.

Now less I misunderstand you, for France to have conquered the American colonies, and added us to France, or for Spain to do the same and add us to Mexico would have been a lawful conquest of a nation against another, because of the mandate of heaven and the fact that those countries have kings. But that for a people to throw off their king, and conquer themselves as it were is unlawful, and makes us a bastard child at the table of worldly power simply because we do not have king (or should I say, a short-term, elected king)?

I’m not particularly offended at the idea that America does not have the best system of governance (my personal favorite was the Anglo variety of Feudalism that became extinct at the battle of Hastings), but I am curious how you think monarchy has fared any better in general, particularly during the last 400 years. While it is no doubt an excellent system so long as a people have a good king, the very nature of the position (particularly since they stopped leading their armies from the front) makes good kings almost mythically rare.

Benighted Savage, I meant that the Christian religion is largely agnostic to the source of political power. I certainly did not mean to imply that it cares not at all for how power is wielded. Certainly Christians ought promote government that 1) secures persons and property; 2) ensures swift and fair justice; and 3) promotes freedom. (In that order, I might add.). But Christianity is, I think, largely agnostic as to what form may in any particular situation best promote these goods.

Forced segregation of churches would deny the unity we have in Christ and would therefore be necessarily opposed by Christians. There is no clear moral requirement that we oppose, in principle, separate cafes or separate public restroom facilities for different identifiable groups. And certainly no requirement that positive law attempt to tear down the fences between groups that naturally arise to make them better neighbors. That does not mean that segregation is the best way to run a polis, or that Christians cannot, for prudential reasons, oppose it; but neither is it necessarily evil.

Indeed, Mr. Savage, we were quite fortunate–miraculously fortunate in fact–to have had the revolutionaries we had. It might easily have gone the way of France (or Russia, or China, or Cuba, or Uganda, or Cambodia, or Rhodesia, or…) But, with revolutionaries as with the prostitute, all that remains is haggling over price.

Benighted Savage, I meant that the Christian religion is largely agnostic to the source of political power. I certainly did not mean to imply that it cares not at all for how power is wielded. Certainly Christians ought promote government that 1) secures persons and property; 2) ensures swift and fair justice; and 3) promotes freedom. (In that order, I might add.). But Christianity is, I think, largely agnostic as to what form may in any particular situation best promote these goods.

If you would be clearer about what you mean by the source of political power, I might be able to respond properly to your vague formulation.

On the face of it, to claim that the Fathers of the Church expressed a strong division between the source of power and how power is wielded flies in the face of the history of Eastern and Western Christianity. They were concerned with both. Just one example: the crowning of Byzantine emperors by the Patriarchs of Constantinople, and the rather elaborate liturgy which developed around the coronation. Contemporary writers didn’t mince words about what — or, more precisely, Who — was the source of the emperor’s power.

But, with revolutionaries as with the prostitute, all that remains is haggling over price.

?????

Just as our Founding Fathers were not racketeers, nor were they prostitutes (on either a literal or metaphorical level). For someone who claims that they are agnostic about the sources of power, you seem unusually concerned with vilifying the sources of the American Republic.

Forced segregation of churches would deny the unity we have in Christ and would therefore be necessarily opposed by Christians. There is no clear moral requirement that we oppose, in principle, separate cafes or separate public restroom facilities for different identifiable groups. And certainly no requirement that positive law attempt to tear down the fences between groups that naturally arise to make them better neighbors. That does not mean that segregation is the best way to run a polis, or that Christians cannot, for prudential reasons, oppose it; but neither is it necessarily evil.

You present a rather anemic position on the scope of Christian unity, and the moral responsibilities of a Christian life — to say the least. To say that Congress could have done a better job dealing with SEGREGATION — race-based or otherwise — is distinct from arguing that “[t]here is no clear moral requirement that we oppose” it. I’d say that the systematic and multi-leveled humiliation of my fellow man that is called SEGREGATION is quite unjust and evil, and to oppose it is a moral duty for all Christians of good will.

However, none of what you wrote directly addresses the point I raised: that smh was incorrect when he claimed that the Rev. King’s position against SEGREGATION did not amount to Christian witness.

>>SEGREGATION — which was a religious, social, cultural, political AND legal phenomenon — was an abomination<<
Benighted is right. Succinctly, segregation was the expression of an anthropology. Christian and Jewish anthropology holds that God made all nations of one man (Acts ch. 17). The very idea of separate-but-equal was a competing, false anthropology. False anthropology, as with all things false, is, sorry Steve N., necessarily evil and of the father of lies.
And I am continually amazed at the sorts of things that get a defense on mc. First the American founders get it on the nose, next we re-evaluate segregation... :)

Just as our Founding Fathers were not racketeers, nor were they prostitutes

But they were, tautologically, revolutionaries–which was my sole point.

For someone who claims that they are agnostic about the sources of power, you seem unusually concerned with vilifying the sources of the American Republic.

The American revolution was an illicit rebellion… just not one in which anyone now living can be implicated. And as illicit rebellions go, it was, I’ll grant, among the very best. That doesn’t mean I don’t love America. On the contrary, you chastise most those you love. The fruits of this rebellion (democracy, egalitarianism, “exceptionalism”, the entire edifice of modern liberalism) not only persist, but grow, and if left unchecked will be her undoing.

By “source” of government, perhaps the word was not well-chosen. I certainly did not mean that Christians did not care whether the “source” of all government was God or not, anymore than they should care whether the “source” of any tsunami was God. Clearly governments, like tsunamis, exist under the providence of God. I thought I was abundantly clear in: “Christianity is, I think, largely agnostic as to what form may in any particular situation best promote these goods.” I.e., that the specific forms of government, or how a particular government came to take power, are of no special theological import. For example, Christianity does not (and cannot rightly) promote “republican” forms of Government, versus other forms. It certainly can (and should) judge the the actions (or failures to act) of governments, however constituted.

Segregation, per se’, is not equivalent to humiliation, which in turn is not per se’ equivalent to injustice, which is, I’ll agree, always and everywhere wrong. You’ve got to connect the dots. Opposition to segregation is certainly allowed in Christian doctrine (and natural law) on prudential grounds; but that is very far from saying it is mandatory.

Moral equality before God is not tantamount to equal social positions and/or associations on earth. Is one, by Christian principles, allowed to favor one’s own near relations over others in the bestowal of association, favors, and wealth? If so, then why would that principal automatically be abrogated when the line of near relations is simply drawn a little bit farther out? I’m not saying I think in-group preferences are necessarily a good thing. I’m just saying they are not necessarily a bad thing, and that the Church is not competent, in that it lies outside her authority, to say that they are.

“the divine office that kings like George III indefensibly appropriated to themselves made them deserving laughingstocks”

knows nothing, or less than nothing, about the legal and constitutional background of the American Revolution. George III never “claimed” or “appropriated” any sort of “divine right of kings” theory to himself. His adolescent essays for his tutors show that he fully accepted that Parliament was the central institution of British government, and that what the “Revolution Settlement of 1689” meant was that the British Parliament (which in British constitutional doctrine was composed of three “estates,” the King, the House of Lords and the House of Commons — all three of which had wide, but ultimately limited, rights and privileges) had complete and unlimited authority over all the component parts of the “British Empire” — not only England and Scotland (which had been politically united in 1707), but also over (as the pre-1707 English Parliament had claimed for itself and actually exercised on occasion for centuries) other “dominions” or “lordships” over which the king was sovereign, such as the Channel Islands, the Isle of Man, the Principality and Marches of Wales (before Wales was fully incorporated into the kingdom of England by statute in 1540) and the Lordship (after 1540: Kingdom) of Ireland (despite the latter having its own parliament). As to the British North American colonies (which did not number only thirteen: others like Bermuda, Nova Scotia, Barbados, Jamaica and St. Kitts stood in relation to Britain on precisely the same constitutional basis in 1750), while the foundation charters of some of them between 1607 and 1640 seemed to contain language removing them from the “jurisdiction” of the English Parliament, and placing them directly under the purview of the King, the Parliament asserted its omnicompetent supremacy over them all — such as then existed — in the 1640s during the English Civil War, and by 1655 had compelled all of them to acknowledge that status. Matters were somewhat more confused during the Restoration period of 1660-1688, but various parliamentary acts in that period were enacted under the “parliamentary supremacy” assumption, and contrary views were no more than the theories of individual thinkers and lawyers — and in any event the so-called “Glorious Revolution” of 1688-89 ended in an assertion of unlimited parliamentary omnicompetence (and, remember, the monarch is one of the three components or “estates” of Parliament) over all the king’s dominions — as witness the Post Office Act of 1713 by which the English Parliament established a postal system throughout the colonies, and levied internal taxes (fairly piddling sums, however) to support it, without seeking any consent from, or even consulting, the various coloinial legislatures.

That certain American thinkers came to believe that the colonial legislatures were “local parliaments” that existed on the same legal grounds as the British Parliament, and, so far from being subordinate bodies to that parliament, were its equals, although “deferring” to its authority on some matters, was a delusion without any historical basis, although such claims were fundamental, at the time and subsequently, to any “legal case” for the American Revolution. The Declaration of Independence’s attempt to fasten the blame for the Revolution on George III as a “tyrant” was a mere piece of propaganda (John Adams in his private writings, then and later, recognized and acknowledged its fundamental falsity); it was easier to blame the Revolution on their misdeeds of a tyrant, than on the legally well-founded, if politically unwise, actions of the British Parliament. In fact, though, George III only gradually, between 1765 and 1773, came to take a hard line against the Americans, and that as he perceived such a line to be the dominant sentiment in Parliament.

Having said this, I must go on to state that the political theories on which the Americans based and “justified” their Revolution were simply adaptations of the Whiggish theories by which the Glorious Revolution of 1688-89 — by which an irregular “Convention” declared that James II had “abdicated” by fleeing England, that the throne was thereby “vacant,” and went on to invite William & Mary to “assume” the vacant throne — had been carried out, actions which had been completely without legal or constitutional merit in England at the time. In other words, “1776” was simply appropriating “1689” for American purposes, and turning them against the English (whose attitude towards “1689 and all that” over the succeeding century was that what had happened was a wonderful “providential act” but one whose lack of any legal or constitutional basis was to be overlooked and buried in oblivion). So in a sense (“what goes around comes around”) I view the American Revolution as a kind of “payback” for the Glorious Revolution, a “glorious” (from my own Catholic perspective) instance of “the biter bit.”

“what the “Revolution Settlement of 1689″ meant was that the British Parliament (which in British constitutional doctrine was composed of three ‘estates,’ the King, the House of Lords and the House of Commons — all three of which had wide, but ultimately limited, rights and privileges) had complete and unlimited authority over all the component parts of the ‘British Empire'”

it would have been more accurate and precise to have written this:

“(which in British constitutional doctrine was composed of three ‘estates,’ the King, the House of Lords and the House of Commons — all three of which had wide, but ultimately limited, rights and privileges vis-a-vis one another, but, when acting as a united ‘body politic,’ had unlimited authority over all persons and corporate bodies [including colonies and other chartered companies] that owed allegiance to the British Crown)”

I think Dr. Hutchens’ misgiving was that MLK Jr. called upon the state to *impose* integration, a solution by power rather than by grace, with that power wrapped in the language of Christianity. But it was no coincidence that it took a Christian to stand up to the segregation system: the system was founded upon the anthropological heresy that interracial relations are even a little bit further out than intraracial, for God made all nations of one man, and we are all Adam.

Indeed, Dr. Tighe, Whiggishness is precisely the adjective! Just as the original English colonists came to Massachusetts because England was not Protestant enough, so to they (Puritan firebrands) agitated for secession against England because it later failed to be Whiggish enough. Sure the English had it comin’, you reap what you so and all that, but all I’m saying is that it was not right (in Natural Law or Revealed Religion) for the hand of any British subject to deliver it.

Clifford, I think you’re taking one true doctrine, viz., that we are all in Adam, and stretching much farther than either Scripture or human reason will allow it to go. Segregation is the natural state of fallen men. Like rivers, oceans, mountain ranges, and impenetrable forests, it is a grace that, given our fallen state, keeps us from slaughtering each other all the more. Following your logic to its purest extreme, the Christian would be forced to object to sovereign national borders, for they serve no purpose but to segregate between an in-group and an out-group. The Church, and her children, must accept and live in the world as it is, whilst never losing sight of the eschaton in which God (not man) brings all things to perfection in Christ.

I have no difficulty at all with Dr. King’s call upon the state to impose integration (although I believe that many of the methods by which it has been imposed have been every bit as unjust, and stupid, as forced racial segregation), since in doing so he was only calling upon the nation to act according to its own Constitution, which hadn’t stipulated that “all men” meant black men too. Dr. King, appealing to the consciences of his fellow Americans, forced the point upon them. He was a constitutional father, born out of time. But with regard to such convictions, Christianity is entirely optional.

I am so tired of the anti-government sentiment in this nation, but especially from those who claim the name of Christ, who taught that government was ordained by His Father, who declared that those who have authority receive it from His Father, and who submitted to such authority, even while it committed the most heinous evil in the long, sorry history of man. Government (by which I will assume you mean human government) does not begin as a protection racket; it begins by the will of the Creator of the universe. Christians, particularly American Christians, would do well to remember that. To defame government as such is to defame the One who ordains it.

That government may descend into being a protection racket is undeniable, but that is because of what some men do to corrupt what God ordained. You might as well say that marriage is an institution for the enslavement of women, as some feminist claim, or that His Church is an agency of oppression, as some atheists proclaim, because men have corrupted those institutions which God ordained. Ronald Reagan was wrong: Government is not the problem. It is bad government that is the problem. And while his phrasing was catchy, Reagan was wrong to say it. And what he said as a catchy campaign line has become a nearly religious belief of many Americans. But it is, in fact, decidedly unchristian to say and believe such a thing.

If Caesar demands us to disobey God’s law, then we must disobey Caesar. But Caesar doing so does not damn government as such; it damns Caesar and then only the Caesar who makes such a demand. We must distinguish between civil disobedience forced upon us when Caesar misuses and corrupts his office by demanding that we disobey God’s law and the wholesale rejection of the divine authority given to Caesar to govern us. If we cannot, then we are just as guilty of rebellion against God as is the corrupt Caesar.

I thought I was abundantly clear in: “Christianity is, I think, largely agnostic as to what form may in any particular situation best promote these goods.” I.e., that the specific forms of government, or how a particular government came to take power, are of no special theological import. For example, Christianity does not (and cannot rightly) promote “republican” forms of Government, versus other forms. It certainly can (and should) judge the the actions (or failures to act) of governments, however constituted.

then Christianity (as you define it) is clearly no longer being agnostic about either the sources or forms of government.

[i.e., according to you some rebellions (like the American Revolution) which are the source of a government are illicit, and thus DO have a theological import. Christianity, according to you, cannot rightly promote republican forms of government — thus, Christianity, as you see it, is weighted against republicanism]

Segregation, per se’, is not equivalent to humiliation, which in turn is not per se’ equivalent to injustice, which is, I’ll agree, always and everywhere wrong. You’ve got to connect the dots. Opposition to segregation is certainly allowed in Christian doctrine (and natural law) on prudential grounds; but that is very far from saying it is mandatory.

Well, according to every history I’ve read (or old timer I spoke with) racial SEGREGATION as practiced in the US when the Reverend King was active WAS equivalent to humiliation. And worse. Why don’t you read (or re-read) the Reverend King’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail”; it contains some telling examples.

BTW, I don’t remember our Lord saying in 22 Matthew that loving my neighbor as myself was merely permissable or a matter of prudential calculation. I recall that the word “commandment” was used. Please don’t forget that we’re talking about following the path of Christ here, not the philosophy of John Rawls.

But with regard to such convictions, Christianity is entirely optional.

How abstract. Still awaiting any proof or argument that Christianity was optional to the Reverend King’s convictions. Below is evidence that it was not.

But American Christians, I must say to you as I said to the Roman Christians years ago, “Be not conformed to this world, but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind.” Or, as I said to the Phillipian Christians, “Ye are a colony of heaven.” This means that although you live in the colony of time, your ultimate allegiance is to the empire of eternity. You have a dual citizenry. You live both in time and eternity; both in heaven and earth. Therefore, your ultimate allegiance is not to the government, not to the state, not to nation, not to any man-made institution. The Christian owes his ultimate allegiance to God, and if any earthly institution conflicts with God’s will it is your Christian duty to take a stand against it. You must never allow the transitory evanescent demands of man-made institutions to take precedence over the eternal demands of the Almighty God.

— Sermon, “Paul’s Letter to American Christians,” 1956

When in future generations men look back upon these turbulent, tension packed days through which we are passing, they will see God working through history for the salvation of man, they will see the gradual fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy: “Every valley shall be exhaulted and every mountain shall be made law; the rough places shall be made plain, and the crooked places straight; and the glory of the Lord whall be revealed,” they will see that God was working through some men who had the vision to see that no nation could survive half slave and half free.

Yes, God is able to conquer the evils of history. His control is never usurped. His ways may seem slow, but his mills are grinding exceedingly fine. If at times we begin to despair because of the relatively slow progress being made in ending racial discrimination, and become disappointed because of the silence of people whose support is so urgently needed, and because of the undue callousness of the federal government, let us gain consolation from the fact that God is able, and in our sometimes difficult and lonesome walk up freedom’s road, we do not walk alone, but God walks with us. He has placed in the very structure of this universe certain absolute moral laws. No matter how much we try, we cannot defy or break them, if we disobey them, they end up breaking us. The force of evi1 may temporarily conquertruth, but truth has a way of ultimately conquering its conqueror.

Government (by which I will assume you mean human government) does not begin as a protection racket; it begins by the will of the Creator of the universe.

Yes, the Creator who, apparently, wills a protection racket.

Christians, particularly American Christians, would do well to remember that. To defame government as such is to defame the One who ordains it.

You say that as if I think a protection racket is a bad thing! No, a protection racket is a VERY GOOD thing… compared to NO GOVERNMENT! And compared to the current USG, it would probably be much cheaper. I’ve no will to impugn protection rackets… my only fear is that they will falsely vilified by association with actual governments.

GL, you are a hopeless romantic! We agree on everything else. He who (figuratively or otherwise) puts a gun to your head and says, “Pay up”, is, de facto sovereign. We hope he, whoever he happens to be, will be a competent, just and gentle ruler; but we do ourselves no favors by imagining abstractions like “legitimacy” have any bearing on the quality of government we might receive from him.

Benighted Savage says:

Christianity, according to you, cannot rightly promote republican forms of government — thus, Christianity, as you see it, is weighted against republicanism

No. For neither can or ought Christianity promote monarchical or oligarchical forms of government. The individual believer is free to believe that one form is better, for prudential reasons, than another, but it is an “I, not the Lord” sort of reasoning. I say again, we are morally obligated to judge the actions or inactions of our particular protection racket. But we are not obligated (nor is it generally useful) to judge the internal bylaws of the corporation who runs the racket.

I say again, we are morally obligated to judge the actions or inactions of our particular protection racket. But we are not obligated (nor is it generally useful) to judge the internal bylaws of the corporation who runs the racket.

And I say, once again, that the “agnostic” position you’ve been arguing for is incoherent and corresponds to no Christian tradition of which I am familiar.

GL, I, for one, agree with you that bad government is the problem, and not government per se’. I am emphatically not a libertarian. In fact, I would advocate the exact opposite: a constitution (actual versus written) that would approach at least the competency of Lee Kuan Yew’s Singapore. But I would not claim that such advocacy is specially Christian or Biblical, i.e., based on Revealed Religion. It would just be a prudential judgement arguable from the situation “on the ground”.

Benighted, I may very well have not articulated my view to your satisfaction, but I doubt you could get more than a hair’s breadth between me, if pressed, and Augustine. The easiest way to correct me is to tell me: What source tells Christians that they should, in principle, be in favor of republican forms of government? Or any form of government?

…I doubt you could get more than a hair’s breadth between me, if pressed, and Augustine.

Given that you don’t state here which of the several propositions you’ve asserted is akin to Augustine’s political philosophy, it’s impossible for me to respond. IF you’re referring to Augustine’s use of the story of the pirate and Alexander in _CoG_, then you’ve poorly understood the point Augustine was making.

The easiest way to correct me is to tell me: What source tells Christians that they should, in principle, be in favor of republican forms of government? Or any form of government?

I’ve already told you — look to histories that discuss the coronation of kings and emperors within the liturgical and apologetic traditions of the “medieval” Western and Eastern Churches. Kantorowicz’s _The King’s Two Bodies_ wouldn’t be a bad place to start. If you want something more recent, look at the literature on the divine right of kings. And remember: just because you might take issue with these traditions, or think them to be deep in error, doesn’t entail that they don’t exist… or that they are not Christian.

So you are saying that one tradition, everywhere and always believed, does exist within Christianity and it is as applicable today as it was in 1077? I don’t think so. That Bishops believed it wise and prudent to crown Christian kings, and to develop liturgies to do so, does not amount to an authoritative endorsement of monarchy, much less any particular monarch, for all time. I’ve no doubt that many have claimed to speak for all Christians for all times with regard to this or that particular constitution of government. That, in fact, is what the Manhattan Declaration purports vaguely to do. I’m simply saying that it goes farther than Revealed Religion allows, and SMH seems to say that too.

So you are saying that one tradition, everywhere and always believed, does exist within Christianity and it is as applicable today as it was in 1077?

I’m obviously NOT saying this. However, as opposed to your “Christian agnosticism,” these Christian traditions approving of monarchy DO exist. We don’t engage these traditions by passing over them in silence, or by proclaiming by fiat a counter-tradition of “political agnosticism” (which looks a lot like political pessimism) without adducing any evidence that such a counter-tradition ever existed. Still waiting to see how a satisfactorily pressed (and no doubt starched) Augustine supports your position.

That Bishops believed it wise and prudent to crown Christian kings, and to develop liturgies to do so, does not amount to an authoritative endorsement of monarchy, much less any particular monarch, for all time.

That any bishop, patriarch or pope believed involvement in the coronations of Christian kings and emperors to be a matter of prudential calculation, free of principled Christian judgement, is something you have yet to show. We await your learned proof of this historical thesis.

I’ve no doubt that many have claimed to speak for all Christians for all times with regard to this or that particular constitution of government.

You’re veering into incoherence again. You do realise that YOU are claiming that, “for all Christians for all times with regard to this or that particular constitution of government,” “[a]ll government begins as a protection racket” and “The Christian Religion is, I think, rather agnostic about how one protection racket, vis-a-vis another, takes and holds power.” Many of those you criticize here have at least had the willingness to more or less reasonably adduce Scripture and Christian tradition to support their general claims.

As far as God being neutral as to forms of government, might we not see in Samuel’s condemnation of Israel’s desire to have a king like all the other nations around them as an implicit statement that God did not intend us to have any king over us but Him? I see in this an implicit teaching that the Enlightenment idea that sovereignty flows from God to the individual and is yielded to an artificial government for prudential reasons on a temporoary basis is closer to God’s ideal than any other political philosophy. Such a govrenment must be very modest indeed and never presume to wield in its own name the power to rule from God. There is no divine right of king’s or republics or any government.

Reagan was right. If by “government” we mean such a body that sees itself as standing between the people and God and ruling over them in His stead with His blessing and authority, such a governemnt is both an idol and a beast in waiting.

But I do find amuzing the statement that Christianity is neutral toward government alongside an accusation that a rebellion is “illicit”. The Ten Commandments and the laws of Moses say that we must not rebel against our parents. They say nothing about rebelling against rulers, for their existence is not recognized. Thus, it seesm to me that the purely neutral Christian responce would be to look at the rebellion of 1776 and be balse about it, neither condemning it as illicit nor approving it as just.

As far as segregation goes, of course Christians must oppose it, for such an policy is based upon a falsehood. To liken segregation to national boundaries is to make a category error. Of course the church is to be above nationalities, but that does not mean it cannot recognize the worldly legitimacy of them. The church should also be above the distinction between the wealthy and the poor but that does not mean that it should not recognize private ownership. The commandment against theft says that it is obligated to recognize it.

It should be recognized that James the lesser’s point about us, in America, being Ceasar is correct. In our Constitutional system the legitimacy of our governers rests upon a presumption that they are servants of “the People” who are the actual rulers. That many of our servants deliberately forget that fact and act as if they had such a divine right to rule over us is beside the point. We, as shareholders of this corporate state are responsible for its maintainance and its rules. We are no obligated as Christians to recognize the legitimacy of a government that has itself de facto violated the terms of its Constitutional existence.

Saint Paul said that if we are free we shpould not make ourselves slaves, not of a master and, it should follow, of a king or a tyranical bureaucracy. Thus, if we still hold in principle individual soveriegncy inherited through our War of Independence (regardless of its legitimacy then, it is as legitimate now as Parliament was then) we are rather obliged to hold onto it against its usurpers.

How we resist losing our freedom, becomes then a prudential matter, much as is the matter of when a nation should go to war.

>>As far as God being neutral as to forms of government, might we not see in Samuel’s condemnation of Israel’s desire to have a king like all the other nations around them as an implicit statement that God did not intend us to have any king over us but Him?<<
Thomas Paine made this very argument -- though I might take Dr. Tighe's hint and not learn too much of my history from Thomas Paine.
On honoring one's parents, incidentally, Ben Franklin's son was a Loyalist. Son and father never spoke to each other again, apparently.

Benighted Savage, you do not seem to be able to distinguish betweeen Revealed Religion, Natural Law, and personal opinion. All truth, of course, is God’s truth, but it isn’t all discovered the same way; it needn’t all be held with the same devotion; and it isn’t all held irreformably.

I don’t know how you’ve come to believe that I believe the things you say I believe. Perhaps I’ve communicated poorly, but by “Chrisitian Agnositicism” to forms of government, I not intended anything more than SMH originally asserted, which I don’t think is really all that controversial. That you possess the time and interest to correct my poor communication skills is at once flattering and disturbing. Of course individual Bishops might prefer one King over another. I’d go as far to say that, when the choice is offerred, they ought to. But what has that to do with the issue at hand?! That has no more universal applicability, is no more a part of Revealed Religion, than my assertion that all government begins as a protection racket.

That assertion, as I’ve tried to explain, was no slam against the necessity of government, nor despairing of the possibility of competent and just government. If I lived in the domain where Christopher Coke ruled, I might very well have been grateful to have had him as a soverign, and be bitter today toward the Jamaican “government” for having deposed him.

Mike Liccione has posted his response on this topic at the First Things blog, to which SMH has also responded there.

Stemming from Liccione’s post, lively discussion continues apace on this same topic at What’s Wrong with the World, largely among a spectrum from moderate Catholic (e.g., JPII) to conservative (e.g., Piux IX) to rad-trad Catholic (so Catholic they’re protestant fundamentalists)… with the odd assortment of food-stuffs thrown in by their resident Protestants.